


Escape Into Me

by raijahn



Category: Smallville
Genre: Angst, Futurefic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-08-28
Updated: 2004-08-28
Packaged: 2017-11-01 10:58:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/355890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raijahn/pseuds/raijahn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sequel to I Walk Alone, also here on SSA.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Escape Into Me

## Escape Into Me

by Raijahn

<http://www.geocities.com/raijahn/raijahns_muse/mainpage.htm>

* * *

"He made you believe I was dead." 

Shock courses through me, every nerve ending on fire in sudden and excruciating awareness. My vision fades and narrows until all I can see is his face. The hazel eyes are now a mockery, clashing in my mind with cool blue grey. The scar stands out like a beacon, forcing my mind away from the belief that Lex has been dead all these years. 

There's a buzzing in my head, drowning out whatever words he's trying to say. Weakness flows through my body, making it hard to stand. 

Long buried memories rise to the surface, catching me off guard. 

*Seeing Lex lying in the casket, so still and lifeless. Touching him and wondering why skin became soft and cool with death. Human lives are so fragile. Shouldn't their skin reflect that? Be dry and brittle? Fall apart at the slightest touch? Standing at the grave having set myself apart from everyone else. Julian opening the casket and kissing his father's forehead, saying goodbye one last time. I saw both of them, their faces close together. How can it be that only one of them exists? Watching the gravediggers lower the casket. Feeling a wrenching pain rip at me after every foot.* 

The agony I felt then was crippling. The pain I feel now less so. But after so many years of numbness, of nothingness, the different levels of pain feel the same. 

As the memories fade, the blackness around my vision recedes, the buzzing noise fades and I feel strength return to my limbs. 

I step back quickly when I feel his hand on my arm. I don't want him touching me. His hand falls away but he still stands too close. 

His presence suddenly enrages me and I shove him away from me, roaring, "I watched them bury you!" Agony like nothing I've felt before replaces the shock of moments earlier. I step forward menacingly and slap him hard across the face. His head snaps to the side and he raises a hand to wipe away the blood that oozes from the corner of his mouth. He then turns back to me, his posture passive, as if awaiting the next hit. Which only serves to inflame me further. His martyrdom will gain him nothing. 

I lower my hand and lean forward until I can feel the puff of his breath on my face. "I ought to kill you," I growl softly, "very slowly. So you can experience what I did. When I watched them lower your body into the ground." His eyes widen and his breathing speeds up. But he doesn't move. 

I seize him by the throat and lift him off his feet, walking to the edge of the roof. The LexCorp Tower is one hundred forty stories high and the border of the roof is only a mere three feet. It's fairly easy to shove him over it, let him dangle with his knees barely hooked over the edge of it. 

"You'll make quite a mess if I drop you." He looks up at me with terror and resignation shining in his eyes but he doesn't say a word. "What? No begging for your life? No, 'Clark, please, don't hurt me'?" I shake him a bit and let out a howl of anger. "Why?! What purpose does it serve to tell me now?" I pull him up and toss him behind me, like a discarded toy. I climb up on the ledge and speak without turning to face him. "Stay away from me, _Julian_." I sneer the name, refusing to acknowledge his true identity. "Or you _will_ regret it. The Clark you knew has been dead for many years. It would be a grave error to assume that your apparent escape from death will resurrect him." I fly away without looking back. 

* * *

I'm grateful that I don't feel the cold like humans do. The fortress where the AI is housed is built in the ground of the Antarctic. Mostly made of ice, the temperatures rarely rise above freezing. 

I sit in one of the inner chambers clad only in a pair of sweats. My body is as cold as the floor I sit upon. Tears have frozen on my cheeks and parts of my chest where drops fell. 

It's been hours since I left LexCorp and came home. Every time I come even remotely close to locking myself down again, escaping back into Superman and Kal-El, the words that shattered everything I thought I knew about him come back to haunt me. 

*"He made you believe I was dead."* 

I just don't understand. Why? What could he have possibly gained from deceiving me for so long? Why tell me now? Did he wait purposely until I was nothing but a stranger to him? Was it some kind of experiment? To see how long I could remain human? 

He was the last one to leave. He was my last tie to humanity, the last reason to hold on to it. When he died... 

Now that reason is back. But there's nothing human left to grasp on to. These new feelings of anger and pain are so foreign I can't accurately describe them. I seem to vacillate between desiring his death, preferably by my hands, and feeling as though I'm nothing but some animal caught in a trap with no way out but to chew through my own limbs. 

I don't want to talk to him, forgive him, love him or understand him. I don't want to hear his voice. I don't want to see his face. I want him to be as dead as I thought he had been. 

"Kal-El, there is an unauthorized human attempting to gain access to the fortress." 

So of course he would be here. 

I head immediately to the outer entrance. I don't pause in the warming chamber, or to put a shirt on, or to wash away the evidence of tears. I refuse to do anything that will make this easier on him. He doesn't deserve any courtesy. He'll be lucky if I don't fly him out to one of the many glaciers without a stitch of clothing. 

I press my hand against the security panel and the door slides open. He stands on the other side, bundled against the cold, bald and blue-eyed again. I step back and let him enter. 

"Let's get this over with." I turn away from him. "Follow me." If he's smart he'll stay where he is. But, no, I hear footsteps behind me and I smirk to myself. 

Let the games begin. 


End file.
